Dial File: Black and white isn't black and white anymore

SEEMED as simple as Cos-and-effect.

Bill Cosby, that is: The Great Black Tele-Hope who, with his seminal "Cosby Show" of the '80s, would finally bridge that gap -- a gap that, in the post-"Roots" era, appeared to be narrowing -- between black and white viewers, fulfilling TV's promise as societal unifier.

Here was a cherished icon who transcended race to become America's impish dad, welcoming both black and white viewers in droves to the same weekly series and -- as much as a mere TV show possibly can -- helping to merge black America and white America into just America.

Cosby offered a hopeful reply to the question: Can't we all just watch along? To which the answer now appears to be: No way -- at least based on current statistics, which spell out S-E-G-R-E-G-A-T-I-O-N among viewers and even series casts.

Stupidly tossing another monkey wrench into the rickety machinery of race relations, we're separating on the airwaves, largely watching shows -- even entire networks -- that match our pigmentation.

While gay themes and characters -- on "Ellen," "Spin City" and next season's "Will & Grace" -- inch into the mainstream, integration inches out. Hispanics and Asians on TV? They're somewhere over The Rainbow Coalition -- but certainly not in it.

Of course, Cosby was not without controversy: His upscale, suburban sitcom clan -- The Huxtables -- was slammed as an "unrealistic" depiction of blacks as well-educated professionals (Cosby's exceptional real life as opposed to real real life, detractors yelped, citing his hoity-toity screen credit as "Dr. William H. Cosby, Jr., Ed.D"). Another complaint: No acknowledgment of black-white strife.

Cosby supporters blasted those criticisms as wanting to confine black characters to lower-class urban stereotypes, and fan racial tension. The characters, they contended, were role models for what blacks could achieve, and provided color-blind lessons to all races on how to live a loving family life.

Bottom line: Both races watched in record numbers, an achievement in itself.

If TV, tied to the requirements of good drama and comedy and dedicated to universal viewer appeal, can't be responsive to every demographic detail in the U.S. Census Report -- we need more Lithuanian optometrists portrayed on TV, declares the League of Lithuanian Optometrists! -- it has been acutely aware of its role in America's overall racial equation.

"The Cosby Show" was a discussion-launcher among the races. Capitalizing on the integrated, color-be-damned audiences that were riveted to " Roots" and made black-themed "Good Times," "The Jeffersons" and "Sanford & Son" hits in the '70s -- and stretching all the way to the now-dying "Family Matters" in the late '90s -- "The Cosby Show" was the apex of an era in which TV was still a racial common denominator. We all watched, even if the depictions sparked disagreements over the decades, from the shuck-and-jive of "Amos 'n' Andy" to the polish of "The Cosby Show."

And now? Even as Cosby dabbles in two current series (in the more downscale "Cosby" and as host of "Kids Say the Darndest Things"), the numbers nullify his advances:

For the season just past, the top three shows among blacks -- Fox's "Between Brothers," "Living Single" and "413 Hope Street," all now canceled -- ranked 117th, 115th and 118th, respectively, among whites. And "Seinfeld," the No. 1 sitcom for whites, ranked 54th among blacks.

Now stretch the trend to network-level: During the fourth quarter of 1997, UPN boasted a 12.3 rating among black viewers, compared to 1.7 among whites, while The WB garnered a 10.2 among blacks and a 1.9 among whites. Conversely, NBC --the network single-handedly rescued from the ratings abyss by "The Cosby Show" in 1984 -- reigned as the No. 1 network among whites with an 11.0 rating, compared to a 7.9 among blacks.

Why the chasm? Certainly the creation of UPN ("Moesha," "Malcom & Eddie," "Sparks" and the giant-leap-backwards-from-Cosby called "Home Boys in Outer Space"), and The WB ("The Wayans Brothers," "The Jamie Foxx Show," "The Steve Harvey Show") has accelerated small-screen segregation, ghetto-izing black shows on their airwaves. Meanwhile, the so-called Big Four largely purge themselves of them.

Last year, The WB and UPN -- not even full-time networks yet -- combined for 11 series starring blacks, while the full-time Big Four combined for seven. Next fall, NBC, ABC, CBS and Fox combine for only two new shows -- ABC's "The Hughleys" and Fox's "Living in Captivity" -- with black leads.

(The Rainbow Coalition even attacked UPN and The WB for stereotyping blacks in such goofy garbage as "Home Boys in Outer Space," an ironic postscript to the criticism leveled at Cosby's sophisticated sitcom of the '80s.)

Put bluntly: UPN and The WB created network TV's Harlem and Watts, while the Big Four stake out Park Avenue and Beverly Hills.

As is obvious by their promos, UPN and The WB market themselves as travelin' the hip-hop highway, erecting cultural roadblocks -- urban black references and attitudes that largely puzzle white "Heartland" America -- that Cosby sought to dismantle. Stuffing their schedules with what they euphemistically call "urban-skewing" series is the weblets' way of carving out brand identities by tapping into a built-in audience -- and by default, they've hung a sign on the door: "PRIVATE PARTY."

Unfortunately, that viewer segregation has been compounded by cast segregation. Last season, three shows with interracial casts -- NBC's "For Your Love" and Fox's "Damon" and "Getting Personal" -- gave it a go. Only "Getting Personal" survived for the fall. Outside of its night of "urban comedies" for the fall, The WB has virtually no black actors in any of its other new shows or dramas, a sad fact mirrored by the Big Four's fall freshmen (there are exceptions on established shows, such as Eriq LaSalle's complex characterization in "ER," among others).

We're left with a growing racial polarization on the tube that yesterday's George Wallace and today's Louis Farrakhan could embrace. But the tide might still turn back to Bill Cosby's TV America, as evidenced by a notable exception to next fall's trend:

UPN has integrated casts in all but one of its new series. Integrated audiences might just follow. In effect, one of the architects of the ghetto wall is taking a swing at it -- if not with a sledgehammer, than at least with a pickaxe.

To paraphrase Ronald Reagan: TV executives -- tear down this wall.

CROON A TUNE: "No phone, no lights, no motor car, not a single luxury." And despite all of those formidable obstacles, reader Janice Kolb still came through by being the first to ID those end theme lyrics to "Gilligan's Island." A big salute to Janice, the skipper of this week's Croon-a-Tune, from her little buddy here at Dial File. But Janice -- the next time you're at, say, Lake Mead, try to avoid a three-hour tour. ... A three-hour tour.

Next? What theme featured dueling voices waxing ecstatic about "the chores! ... the stores! ... fresh air! ... Times Square!"? As usual, be the first Croon-a-Tuner, via phone or e-mail, to cook up the correct answer and we'll serve up your name, hot and tasty, in next week's lip-smackin' Dial File.

Pass the ketchup.

PSYCH-OUT: Let's see if I've got this straight: About to open is "The X-Files" movie, based on a TV series rich in conspiracies and paranoia about what's real and what isn't, while the box office is ruled by "The Truman Show," a movie about a man who suspects he's the target of a lifelong conspiracy to make a TV show out of his real life, a theme first explored in depth by kids living their lives for the camera in MTV's "The Real World," which debuted new episodes this week.

That's enough of that ... I'm giving myself a headache.

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